xavier cortada
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Antarctic Mural
and Painting Homage to Shackleton (South Pole Station):.
Cortada thought to honor Shackleton by "placing him" permanently in the South Pole, the place that so eluded him in life. The artist hopes that Shackleton's portrait (which is on permanent exhibit inside the United States' Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station) serves to inspire those now working in the most inhospitable of continents, especially those who winter during cold, dark months in the South Pole.
On January 4, 2007, Cortada
presented his "Shackleton in the South Pole" painting to the
South Pole Station's NSF Representative Jerry Marty and Station
Manager B. K. Grant at the Geographic South Pole, conceptually
bringing the Shackleton to the place he so longed to reach.
The artist created the portrait using canvas, acrylic paint,
crushed Mt. Erebus crystals, soil samples from the Dry Valleys,
soil samples from Ross Island, McMurdo Sound seawater, GIS maps of
the Antarctic continent, copies of historic photographs and maps
of Sir Ernest Shackleton's expeditions. In essence, through
his painting, Shackleton brought to the South Pole pieces of the
continent he "opened" for the rest of us to experience.
McMurdo Station is the largest of the three year-round US stations in Antarctica. Everyone in the McMurdo Station is with the National Science Foundation flew in to either support or direct working on a science project. During his artist's residency, Cortada created a collaborative "message mural" asking members of the McMurdo community what brought them to Antarctica. Participants wrote their answers on a piece of paper which the artist affixed to his 8-foot long mural. Cortada created the mural on wood using the participants' messages, pastels, acrylic paint diluted with melting sea ice from the Ross Sea, soil samples from the Antarctic Dry Valleys and a giant satellite photo of Ross Island, where McMurdo Station sits.
On January 8, 2007, the
collaborative mural was unveiled during a lecture the artist was
presenting the McMurdo Library. Cortada presented the
mural to McMurdo's National Science Foundation Representative David
Bresnahan.
The art work is on permanent exhibit in Building 155 at the
McMurdo Station.
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